The Moderating Role of Safety Climate in the Relationship Between Perceived Organizational Support and Construction Workers' Safety Behavior

The role of safety climate in moderating the relationship between perceived organizational support and safety behavior is crucial for understanding the determinants of construction workers' safety behavior and enriching the theoretical explanation of safety behavior. Our theoretical model posits that safety climate enhances the perceived support from the organization for safety, subsequently influencing construction workers' safety behavior. The influence of organizational support for safety on individual safety behavior is mediated by the created environment (Ancarani, Di Mauro, & Giammanco, 2017). Safety climate, as a contextual variable, reflects employees' expectations of positive outcomes associated with safety behavior, both in the short term and with higher probabilities (Griffin & Curcuruto, 2016). It is clear that safety climate directly or indirectly impacts various dimensions of safety behavior. Prior research has predominantly focused on the direct impact of safety climate on safety behavior (He, McCabe, Jia, & Sun, 2020; Mohammadfam, Mahdinia, Aliabadi, & Soltanian, 2022), rather than exploring the potential moderating role of safety climate in the relationship between perceived organizational support and safety behavior. To comprehensively understand the safety behavior of construction workers, it is necessary to consider the interactions between perceived organizational support and safety climate. This study addresses this research gap by demonstrating the moderating effect of safety climate on the positive relationship between perceived organizational support and construction workers' safety behavior. Specifically, the positive relationship between perceived organizational support and safety behavior is stronger when safety climate is higher. Furthermore, safety climate enhances the positive effect of perceived organizational support on safety behavior.